


TIME ENOUGH

by Mikkeneko



Category: Dragon Age (Video Games), Dragon Age - All Media Types
Genre: Act III, Angst, M/M, Mild Smut, anders powerful magic should not be used for this purpose, anders stop, anders what are you doing, oh well
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-02-27
Updated: 2016-02-27
Packaged: 2018-05-23 12:12:47
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,442
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6116099
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Mikkeneko/pseuds/Mikkeneko
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Hawke gets a visit from a man who is out of time.</p>
            </blockquote>





	TIME ENOUGH

**Author's Note:**

  * For [](https://archiveofourown.org/gifts).



He’d lost track of time. Hawke looked up from his pile of half-finished correspondence at the sound of the knock on the estate’s cavernous front door, and frowned at the sight of how far the candles had burned down. He hadn’t meant to get so absorbed in his work; he’d resolved not to let the Champion business swallow his life. Yet with the absence of his mother… his siblings, even the Feddic family… the estate echoed so emptily, it was a relief to find anything to take his mind off it.

He swung open the front door, and the familiar silhouette on his doorstep came as a surprise. “Anders!” he exclaimed, pleased and concerned at the same time. “Sorry, I wasn’t expecting you here. You never come up through Hightown. What’s up?" 

Anders smiled at him; the expression looked difficult, as though he hadn’t used those muscles in a while. "H-hello, Garrett,” he said. “Sorry to intrude – I know it’s late, and you must be busy…”

“Don’t be ridiculous; I always have time for you,” Hawke assured him. “Come in, come in.” Hawke ushered his boyfriend inside, growing increasingly alarmed as Anders stepped into the light. Anders looked haggard, worn; Hawke knew that he worked too hard and his living conditions in Darktown were hardly the best, but he thought he’d been making some progress in getting Anders fed and rested right.

The last few weeks had been bad, getting worse; the city was on the precipice of disaster, he could feel it. The situation at the Gallows was intolerable, and with the last of the Mage Underground disbanded –  _not that Hawke knew anything about that, for certain –_   there was no more outlet to the pressure that was steadily building behind those stone walls. Meredith’s Templars had all but taken over the city, forcing the guardsmen from their normal duties in search of suspected maleficar while mundane criminals took advantage of the authority’s preoccupation to run rampant. Well, more rampant than usual.

Hawke did what he could, where he could, but he was only one man, and some problems couldn’t be solved by hitting them. It hurt him, to see Anders and be reminded that for all his wealth, all his strength and his supposed position, he could not fix the world for the man he loved. He couldn’t make him happy.

But he could try. Hawke bundled Anders up the stairs and fussed over him, taking his ratty coat aside and undoing his boots. He didn’t know where Anders had been in the past few days, but his clothes were in as atrocious a state as the rest of him; he looked as though he had aged three years in three days. There were new patches on trousers that were already mostly patches, and he didn’t recognize the boots at all.

“What are you doing here?” Hawke said as he put the puzzling boots by the door and came back to sit next to Anders. “I thought you were spending the day at your clinic?”

“I… yes, I did say that, didn’t I?” Anders looked uncomfortable, eyes glancing to the side and shoulders slumped with defeat. “I… decided that I needed to be here, more. I needed – needed to see you. Even if I know I don’t have the right…”

“Are you all right?” Hawke peered at his lover anxiously. Was that grey hair, mixed among the blond? He didn’t remember seeing that there before. “Maker, you look terrible. What happened to you?”

Anders’ face fell, and he looked even more defeated. Actually, he looked like he might cry. “Nothing more or less than I deserve,” he said softly.

It was a clear evasion, but Hawke had already determined that he wasn’t going to pry. Anders was not a terribly good liar, and Hawke knew that there were things that he was hiding – but he trusted his lover enough to have good reasons for the deception, and he would not be another source of stress and pressure to Anders now.

Instead, he shifted around until he was half-kneeling on the carpet in front of Anders, hands on his knees, looking up into his face. “You deserve happiness,” he asserted firmly. “Maker knows, for all you do for this city – for all of us – no one deserves it more.”

He wasn’t surprised to see a sheen of tears gleam in Anders’ eyes, although he smiled despite that. “No matter how many times I hear you say that, I still can’t bring myself to believe it,” he murmured.

Arguing with him, Hawke knew from experience, would get them nowhere. Instead he reached up and cupped Anders’ face in his hands – surged up from the carpet to claim his mouth in a kiss, and Anders fell into it hungrily. He kissed like he was starving, like he was drowning, and Hawke the only spar in a storm-tossed sea.

Hawke pushed up and over the edge of the bed, guiding Anders down on his back while he climbed up between his too-patched trousers; Anders clung to his shoulders, his chest heaving with gasping breaths as he kissed Hawke’s lips, his throat, his chest, any part of him he could reach.

They made love by the light of the late-night fire, in the same bed they had the first time, and many times since then. Anders’ hands roved restlessly over Hawke’s body, as though seeking to memorize every inch of him, to burn the feel into his fingertips. He fell back and opened himself gladly, crying out with ecstasy when Hawke entered him, their bodies moving together in the familiar rhythm like two halves of one being, finally rejoined.

Afterwards they lay together on top of the coverlet, Anders curled against Hawke’s side, his head resting on Hawke’s chest. His cheekbones dug in a little too sharply, and Hawke played with the strands of silver in his lover’s hair, and worried.

Anders spoke first. “Hawke, I just want you to know…” He sighed. “No matter how much I give to my work – to our cause – the time I spend with you is more precious to me than any other.” He shifted around until he could look into Hawke’s eyes, their bright honey color darkened in the low light. “I want you to know that.”

“I do,” Hawke soothed him, running his hands over Anders’ back. The low light, the intimate quiet made him say things he could never have said in the light of day. “…I wish we could just stop time and make this moment last forever… But that’s not possible, is it?” he sighed. “Not even with magic.”

Anders abruptly shifted until he was facing away, tucking his back against Hawke’s side, snuggling close. “You know, actually…” he said, hesitating as he spoke. “There are some theories that it might be possible. In theory.

"Time in the Fade doesn’t work the same way as it does here, we already know that. In a place where the Veil has been torn, by some cataclysm dire enough to burn the whole sky… the rules might change. With the help of a powerful spirit, maybe time could slow, or warp, or even run backwards – and a man could step from future to past like stepping across a stream. As many times as he liked.”

Hawke blinked, sitting up a little to stare down at the back of Anders’ head. “Do you think that could happen?” he asked curiously.

Anders was silent for a long, long time, and then he gave a little shrug. “Who knows?” he said softly.

There was no more talk of magic and theory; they had their second wind and made the most use of it, Anders rolling Hawke over onto his back as they made love again. His hands clutched at Hawke as he thrust into him, long shakes running through him from head to toe with the intensity of his longing.

“Shhh… it’s okay,” Hawke tried to soothe him, kissing the tears away. “I’m not going anywhere. We have all the time in the world.”

Anders stilled for a moment, kissing him back, eyes closed. When at last he opened them again, there was something in their depths that Hawke couldn’t fathom. “Yes,” he said quietly. “I do.”

Afterwards, Anders didn’t stay; Hawke had hoped he might, but it was rare that he could, and growing rarer. Too much of what kept Anders busy took place at night, and he wrapped himself in his threadbare clothes and patchwork coat and stepped out the door again, blending quickly into the mists. “See you tomorrow, love,” he said, and then he was gone.

* * *

 

~end.

**Author's Note:**

> Alternate summary: "that time Anders broke the laws of space and time for a booty call." Your guess is as good as mine where Hawke is in the future that he's not with Anders; did they split up? Did Hawke get left in the Fade? Best not to know...


End file.
